Jack McCaffery is the lead sports columnist for the Daily Times and delcotimes.com. He has spent several decades covering everything from the Phillies, Eagles, Flyers and Sixers, to college hoops, to high school sports in Delco.

Saturday, February 18, 2017

ROY JONES JR. WINS ANOTHER CHAMPIONSHIP

WILMINGTON, Del. >> Roy Jones Jr., the former world heavyweight champion, showed enough of his familiar skills Friday night to win the WBF cruiserweight championship with an eighth-round TKO of Bobby Gunn.

Before a packed Chase Center, with a capacity of about 2,200, Jones won just about every round (six of the seven scored on the Daily Times card) and staggered Gunn late in the seventh round. Gunn's corner waved off the fight before the eighth round, which technically had begun. Thus, Jones' victory occurred at seven seconds into the eighth round.

Gunn, better known earlier in his career as a bare-knuckle champion in Canada, fell to 21-7-2 as a pro. Jones, a certain Hall of Famer to be, is 65-9. Asked if his career would continue, Jones indicated it would, as long as it was worth his while.

Gunn was impressed by Jones, who has won world championships in four weight classes and is recognized as one of the best, all-time, pound-for-pound: "I enjoyed seeing him beat me up."

Jones, 48, has won 10 of his last 11, though against dramatically downgraded competition from when, in the 1990s, he was voted as the fighter of the decade.

Earlier Friday, Kanat Islam showed why he was ranked No. 4 by the WBA with an impressive first-round knockout of Robson Assis. His forehead severely bleeding from an early head-butt, Islam, of Kazakhstan, used his remarkable hand-speed and instinct for violence to overwhelm Assis of Brazil.

The KO came at 2:12 of the first, and Islam's camp immediately called out Floyd Mayweather. He improved to 23-0. Assis is 16-4.

Also, popular lightweight Joey Tiberi Jr., of Delaware scored a fourth-round TKO over game Bryan Simmons of St. Joseph, Missouri at 2:04 of the second. Tiberi improved to 14-2. Timmons is 5-9.

Frank DeAlba of Allentown (21-2-2) won a unanimous decision over German Emeraz of Mexico (55-42-1) in a junior lightweight prelim. And Dagoberto Aguero of the Dominican Republic impressed in improving to 11-0 with a super bantamweight majority decision over Olimjon Nazarov of Uzberkistan (14-5).